This just in: Free ringtone spam might be a scam.

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If I’ve learned one thing from the internet, it’s that unsolicited offers of free stuff are, more often than not, bad news. Believe it or not, Nigerian princes do not actually want to give you 12 million dollars. Nor do any of those obnoxious advertisers actually want to give you a bunch of free stuff for your cell phone. Sure, you may get a free Flo-Rida ringtone, but chances are you just signed yourself up for some ridiculous contract which states you have to send them $30 dollars per month tucked inside a box of hair.

The Inquirer is reporting on a ringtone scam going on in the UK involving content provider 2COMM and service provider Tanla Mobile. Consumers were sent a message promising them a free ringtone, which upon download locked them to a subscription service requiring they pay around 9 dollars per week . Over 450 customer requests to cancel the subscription were ignored, which the company responsible blames on system failures.

Yeah, yeah. I know – caveat emptor. Now how do you say “Just because it’s legal to squeeze nonsense like this into the fine print doesn’t mean it’s not lame” in Latin?